


I'm Gonna Fly

by StarvingMe



Series: Inqed Words [7]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Sad Fluff, forgetting is sad, happy-ish ending?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-05
Updated: 2015-08-05
Packaged: 2018-04-13 02:52:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4504896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarvingMe/pseuds/StarvingMe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Inquisitor starts to forget things--so the Wordsmith tries to help her remember what she can.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm Gonna Fly

_So I’m gonna fly  
_ _Higher then I ever could  
_ _Feel the wind blow through my hair  
_ _Feel the sun dance with the moon  
_ _And my feet can’t stay on the ground any longer  
_ _With a leap of faith I feel a little stronger  
_ _Wanna swing from a star in the big blue sky  
_ _Don’t wanna watch it all go by so I’m gonna fly!  
_ _~I’m Gonna Fly_  by Sydney Forest

 

The first time Wordsmith came home to an empty apartment, she panicked.  There had been no note left, the guest room spotless, the dishes cleaned and put away, the books straightened in the library…

The Inquisitor was gone.

She ran outside, trying to see where she might’ve gone, about to see if she could get Juliet to make a quick run when she heard a cheery voice calling out to her.  Turning, she found her, waving from the roof.  A few anxious minutes later, and the Inquisitor was rescued from the roof, having gone up there for some fresh air and locked herself out on accident.  A spare key to the roof was acquired,

A few days later, when the Wordsmith slipped into her empty flat, she simply sighed and headed up to the roof to find the Inquisitor perched on the ledge, staring up at the sky as the clouds passed.  When pressed, she admitted to liking the open sky and listening to the people, but Wordsmith couldn’t help noticing the faraway look in her eyes.  She said nothing, though, and simply watched her.

Once in a while, as they poured together over books, the Inquisitor had to stop and rub her eyes, shaking her head tiredly as she said the words kept jumping around on the page.  The first time it happened, she was shooed to bed and urged to catch up on the sleep she was clearly missing.  More and more often, though, she was having trouble with the texts, having to concentrate hard to focus on the page.  

It wasn’t until the Wordsmith caught her reading the same page for an hour before she finally said quietly, “I can’t read this…”  The revelation was a startling one, especially when the Inquisitor confessed to other changes, little things that she was noticing here and there:  forgetting the names of the other angels in her unit, even those that had taken part in her banishment; the proper sigils for warding against angels that might be watching; and one night over boxed macaroni and hot dogs, she even confessed she had trouble recalling what Heaven was like.

At the rate she was losing herself, she would lose all of her memories…

“This can’t be caused by you losing your grace,” Wordsmith said, frowning as she carefully removed the last of the stitches, listening to the Inquisitor’s soft whimper at each slow tug.  “This never happened to any of the others…”

“I know,” she said softly, trying not to squirm as she flinched.  “I just…  I can’t stop it…”

“Have you noticed any other changes?” the demon asked, frowning as she pulled another stitch free.  “Any other things you can’t remember clearly?”

“… I can’t remember what Juliet looks like…” the Inquisitor murmured softly, head bowing as if in shame.  “Tried to draw a picture of her today…  All I could remember were the eyes, and the teeth…”

Suppressing a smile, Wordsmith grunted. “Well, that’s all most people remember usually, so not so bad with that…”  Casually snipping the next stitch, she asked, “Anything else?”

The Inquisitor was silent again, head falling a little to the side as she said, “I can’t see your true face anymore…”

Careful hands stilled for a few moments as red eyes flashed up at her friend before she continued her work. “Hmm… Was starting to think you couldn’t see it from the beginning…” she said quietly.

Looking over her shoulder at her friend, she managed a very small smile, “Of course I could see it…  That’s… how I knew it was you…”

“I see,” Wordsmith said, frowning as she met her friend’s gaze.  “So then, if you can’t see it now, how do you know it’s me?”

The Inquisitor’s smile was bright as she looked at her friend.  “My vessel knows yours and can see it… I’ve always been able to see both…  Now I just… can’t see the one…  But I know it’s you in there…”

Nodding a little, the demon asked, “But you can’t sense it.”

The angel’s face fell a little at that before she shook her head.  “No… not anymore…”

Sighing, she pulled the last stitch out, leaning back a little to look over the patchwork of scars along her back.  The sigils had been carved effortlessly, the lines smooth as if they’d used a hot knife on butter.  She had to admit, as far as tortures went, it was definitely a real piece of work.  It acted as a way to bind the angel, marking her all the way down to her very soul—even the Wordsmith could see where the blades had gouged the deepest.  It almost hurt to see this, the vulnerability that had been laid bare in her friend, seeing where not only had the ties to her wings been severed, but where they’d carved them out of her back. Even now, she didn’t have full function regained in her arms—the damage to the tendons and ligaments almost beyond her vessel’s ability to heal.  If she didn’t get her grace back soon, she would probably be beyond even her own healing powers.

The more they looked, however, the less they seemed to find.  The depth of their branding wasn’t fully known until she had gone to the doctor at last to be seen again and they saw the images on the x-rays.  More binding sigils had been burned into her bones, keeping the Inquisitor in place.  When she heard the news, the Inquisitor looked ready to give up, but once they got back to the apartment, she dove back into the texts, looking for something,  _anything_ that would help to free her.

After three long months of looking, of searching and hoping and just waiting, the Wordsmith came home with pizza and an armful of more books for research, and one for the Inquisitor to read, to keep her occupied during her long days alone.  Setting the box down, she called out to the Inquisitor, even as she realized the apartment was empty again.  Sighing as she set the books down, she grabbed her roof key, turning to slip out into the hall and climb the narrow steps.  

A gust of cool wind greeted her when she pushed the door open, frowning as she realized that the weather was getting cold again.  If this kept up, she’d have to get some better clothes for the angel—being trapped in her vessel seemed to make her more sensitive to the hot and cold, remembering the first barely-chilly morning when she found the angel shuffling around, bundled up in a blanket, the edge tucked under her feet so she could slide slowly over the hardwood floor.

The amusing memory was gone in an instant when she spotted the Inquisitor, standing on the edge of the building.  Her arms were outstretched, spread as wide as they could go, the wind catching her loose skirts and sending them fluttering around her as she stood there, perched as perfectly still as a statue, until she noticed the Inquisitor lean just slightly forward…

_She’s going to jump_.

She didn’t even know what she was doing, her legs carrying her across the roof, hands reaching out to grasp the back of her dress and pull hard, yanking her back from the ledge.  With a surprised shriek, the Inquisitor flailed her arms, tumbling back into the Wordsmith as she struggled a moment, trying to get her feet under her again.  Seeing her friend’s face, she was about to ask what the big idea was when she saw the look of anger, hurt, and even a flash of concern in those red eyes, her argument dying in her throat.

“What the  _bloody Hell_  were you doing up there?!” Wordsmith half-shouted as the Inquisitor straightened herself again.  “If you’d fallen, you  _would have died_!”

“I-I know…” the angel murmured, avoiding the demon’s gaze.  “I just… I don’t know…”

“Why?! Just tell me why you were even thinking about standing on that ledge!” she cried, searching her friend’s face for an answer as blue eyes finally met hers.

“I just…” she started to say, the words catching in her chest again as the shame hit her full force.   _Another thing that the silly bird has forgotten…_  “… I was trying to remember… what it felt like to fly…” she finally managed, her shoulders slumping as tears filled her eyes. “I… I couldn’t remember anymore…”

Frowning, the Wordsmith found herself in unfamiliar territory, caught between being angry and feeling— _feeling—_ guilty. Here her friend was trying to do something on her own, something that terrified her, desperate to hold onto what little she still had of her true self, and all she could see was her friend trying to take the easy way out…  But still…

“You could’ve said something, you know,” she said quietly, turning to lead her friend back inside.  “No need to just bottle it all up…

The Inquisitor bowed her head as they walked together down the stairs, finally murmuring, “You do so much for me, Wordsmith…  I can’t possibly pay this debt…”

Ruffling the brunette’s hair, she nudged her into the apartment, shaking her head.  “We’ll worry about debts and repayment later.  For now, eat…”

 

***

 

“I don’t understand the point of the blindfold, Wordsmith,” the Inquisitor said as she was led from the cab to where the group was waiting for them, the instructor smiling as they kept quiet.  “I don’t know where we are, so really, there’s no point in keeping it a secret…”

“It’s called a surprise,” Wordsmith said, looping her arm in the angel’s as they reached the top.  Finally reaching up, she tugged the blindfold free, watching as the Inquisitor blinked to adjust to the bright sunlight.  Her reaction to the safety equipment was less than what the Wordsmith had expected, to be honest, and she didn’t even really react when one of the instructors started to explain how to hold the bar and helping to show how to strap themselves into the safety harness and adjusting their helmets.  She kept looking to Wordsmith, who insisted she was just there to spectate, smiling as she watched the confused angel trying to figure out what they were doing.  Her vessel kind of knew what was going on, but other than a surge of slight panic, she didn’t get much of an idea.

It wasn’t until one of the instructors took a running leap and glided into the air that the Inquisitor’s eyes lit up, jaw dropping open as her entire face brightened up.  Her eyes were glinting and she was suddenly excited, looking over at Wordsmith as she just grinned from ear to ear.  She didn’t even wait for the instructor to give the go-ahead, simply taking a running leap for the edge and slipping into the open air, her hands gripping the bar of the glider as she gave a wooping cry.  The joy in her voice echoed through the canyon as she banked, catching a thermal and rising in the air with an excited flutter in her chest.  It wasn’t exactly the same, she could feel the muscles of her back instinctively tensing and shifting as if trying to move wings that weren’t there, but the wind was in her face and she felt free, weightless, and for a while, things felt  _right_.


End file.
